Anthem exec: Data-sharing will trump hospital mergers

Some hospital systems will merge or partner in the next few years — the most prominent pending deal involves Aurora Health Care and UW Health — but after that, advances in data collection and data sharing will nix the need for further consolidation, says Larry Schreiber, president of Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Wisconsin. While the need for greater efficiencies will drive merger-and-acquisition activity in the near term, technology improvements will supplant consolidation as the wave of the future, Schreiber told me in an interview.